04.11.15 Songluo Lake Trail journal- part 2 You may wonder why I carried eggs for hiking… The truth is, we carried much more than eggs, it was a whole set of a mutten hotpot, included pot, gas stove, cabbage, instant noodles etc. Back to the eggs, the only luck I got was we were still at the rest stop, I could wash the egg off and didn't have to get along with it the whole time. My friends helped me carry my stuff and I took a plastic bag filled with the rest of the eggs and some light things. Without my backpack, I looked like I have just done some shopping in Walmat and ended up in the woods out of nowhere. LOL. This trail is really quite a hard level, especially if you do a round trip in one day. I didn’t do any research, so I had no clue and just went with my foolish bravery. Every time I thought, this must be the hardest section, there was always another one harder, sometimes we had to use a rope to help us climb up. (Now I can literally feel the sores just by thinking about it.) At about noon, I finally made it to the lake, even though I didn’t look like a hiker at all. Haha. It was really foggy and rained lightly by the lake, we couldn’t take a good rest, but we were still very satisfied with the hotpot. There’s nothing better than eating a hot soup after a long rainy day hike. (Actually there is, a good sleep. But it was no chance to happen anyway. Haha) On the way back, our backpacks were much lighter since we consumed most of the foods and water, but our feet were also much heavier. I was so exhausted and wasn’t sure about if I could manage the same trail again. “Could somebody give me a rescure helicopter?”, I shouted out in my head. The weather became worse and worse, and we had to leave the woods before it got dark, we didn’t have much time to take a rest on the way. My knees were killing me, it took a lot of willpower to take every step. We kept telling ourselves, “almost there! last 30 mins!”, and about 5 more 30 mins went by, we finally saw our cars!!!!!!!! I couldn’t be happier!! Then we drove back to the B&B, the owner was so kind letting us use some bathrooms, and I had the best shower ever! My feelings of this trip was so complicated, started from stuffed, tired, regreted, satisfied, anxious, painful, accomplished to proud. And my legs were like iron rods for the next 3 days. I’m not sure If I would do it again, but I’m really happy that I did and also blissful that I have bunch of friends can do it with me. We made it!! I’m so proud of us! :D <The end>

04.11.15 Songluo Lake Trail journal- part 1 It has been raining for a few days, but we have planned this trip for a month and didn't intend to cancel it. So we got on the road anyway. We arrived in YiLan on Saturday afternoon, and first stopped at few food stands to buy YiLan’s popular specialties: Fried scallion pancake and ice cream burritos! They were so good; I could literally eat them all day. Haha. Then we went to do a hot spring fish pedicure, another specialty here. This is one thing I like to do in YiLan because I like fish a lot and it is fun to watch fishes and get an itchy feeling at the same time. After everyone has their feet nicely done, the food seeking game just continued…. I have no idea why my fellows could all eat like a horse. They must all have a wormhole-like stomach! Finally, I lived though the eating contest and we were at the B&B (with my about-to-explode stomach). This B&B, run by local aborigines, has a pool, karaoke stage and a BBQ area. When we arrived, there were already bunch of aborigines celebrating for a marriage proposal; and they were so nice and hospitality to ask us to join. We drunk, ate (yeah, my fellows kept eating) and played until midnight, I was happy about this, not only because the celebration was fun, but also the feeling about the hiking would certainly be canceled due to bad weather and our lack of sleep. But it was not. Everyone woke up at 5 in the morning, so I had to, too. We had a quick breakfast before taking off, and then drove to the starting point of the hiking trail. Songluo Lake is also known as a 17-year-old girl, because it is often surrounded by fog, just like a bashful teenage girl hides herself behind the curtain (I don’t think it suits today’s teenage girls anymore, lol). The trail is about 6 km one way; it takes 4 hrs to get to the lake and 3.5 hrs going back. The weather was ok on Sunday, sun showed up a little bit and no rain at all, but the trail was still very muddy and slippery. There was a faucet rest stop at 2.6k, hikers can take a break and clean up a little bit here. When I was just ready to hit the trail again and put on my backpack, I found the bottom of my backpack was slimy. “shoot!” Just what I thought, the eggs I carried in a cup were broken.<to be continued>